It is not easy to end such story. It takes energy and an extra thinking to disconnect the never-ending chain of poverty and illiteracy.
Quoting one of Nelson Mandela’s famous sayings, that “education is the most powerful weapon which you can use to change the world.” If one receives good quality of education, he or she will be able to break the story of losing, out of a vicious cycle that has occluded them for years and years.
This story of losing is like a novel-series that publishes the same stories with the same character. I am that character in that story, and I choose to get out of that story. One that is profound and sad, a story that is quite stinging to remember, however will undoubtedly be inspiring to those who are currently within the same story.
This story is being lived by Mauleum village in Timor Tengah Selatan, NTT. They fight against life challenges every day though the average skills of human resources there is so behind. They seem unable to have strong dream to end this story of losing. It looks like they are being abandoned, and none helps them get out of this situation.
New Assignment
I am neither a hero nor a Superman; I am just a teacher who want to help some of them, lead them and bring them out of the darkness to light. My name is Neno and this is my story.
Since July 2018, I had been working as a teacher in one of secondary school in Mauleum village. Aside from this role, I also worked as a tutor after school for primary students at the villages. To date, a tutor role had been taken over by my other colleagues and I moved to the other tutorial group, which consist of only several students.
Over the past few months, weather was not so good as we were in rainy season. Tutorial session was not favorable to us; presence rate was declining. I did not blame them at all. I realized when I reflected back, my relationships to them was too dry. I only cared about delivering knowledge without building relationships and knowing them deeper to strengthen their characters.
New Breakthrough
There were some of my students that did not really like tutorial class after school. They were also trapped in terrible society where drinking and smoking became habit, so that they were not keen to come to tutorial class anymore. To draw them from this pitfall, I asked them to stay overnight at my place and I asked them to go with me hunting birds. People here loved hunting birds. We called it “Fiti Burung”.
I remembered our Fiti Burung that day. It was raining, glaring thunder and heavy storms. During that walk, I listened to their stories. They were so funny; they liked to throw jokes and my only job there was laughing.
